


Push

by jackdawq



Category: Persona 4
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-11
Updated: 2013-04-11
Packaged: 2017-12-08 03:24:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/756456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jackdawq/pseuds/jackdawq
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yukiko and Kanji, and the problem of inertia. Companion piece to 'Snowball'.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Push

The standard belief is that Chie and Yukiko are the oldest friends on the team, the core. If you count days, months, years, that's true – but they didn't meet until Yukiko was eight. She knew Kanji Tatsumi well before that. It sounds like a strange combination, the delicate Amagi heir and the tattooed delinquent, but those are just the roles they've let themselves fall into, their oversimplified personas (no pun intended, Yukiko thinks, trying not to giggle). As small children, their worlds were less at odds. The inn's long been a loyal customer of the textiles shop, and Yukiko often accompanied the head of staff on errands. While Kimura-san and Tatsumi-san organized deliveries and gossiped a little along the way, Yukiko used to chat with the small, friendly boy who always seemed interested in her kimonos and once asked her if she was a princess. _They're in the books at school_ , he said, _an' you look a lot like one._

_Princess_. The idea made Yukiko laugh at the time. It still does now, and not in a good way. Kanji was right all along, and she has her own towering marble castle to prove it. Likewise, he has his bathhouse, Rise her strip club, Naoto her secret base; each of them with their own inner monster to face. Yukiko can feel hers inside of her even now, its thrashing quieted but never silenced. It's the same for the others, she tells herself, it _has_ to be - but the knowledge doesn't really help.

Deep down, she still wants her prince. The difference now is that she doesn't need to search for her - or rather, she was there all along.

* * *

 

Yukiko isn't quite as oblivious as everyone seems to think. Her mind might tend to drift a little, but she notices certain things. Like how Chie always makes sure to pass the inn on her morning run and waves up at Yukiko's room from the road outside; or how she crosses her fingers every time they jump into the TV; or how she moves in battle, fluid and graceful and powerful.

...Maybe there's a pattern to the things Yukiko notices.

But she also sees the way Kanji usually stands apart from the group, like there's a distance there he doesn't know how to bridge. It reminds her of the reason they drifted apart to begin with: the way he changed after his father's death, remade himself in an image designed to push people away. The piercings and tattoos were part of that, just like the attitude that got him regularly hauled into Inaba's police station. He stopped coming to school for weeks at time, and on the rare occasion she saw him in the shopping district, the sheer aggression in every step had made her too nervous to approach him. That's changed now – she trusts him with her life – but the damage was already done.

Long before she got Konohana Sakuya, Yukiko was always the healer with Kanji. She still remembers the girl whose bag he repaired at school, the other girls who sneered at him, and how Yukiko stayed in the playground even after class started, trying to console him. The same girls picked on him for a dozen petty reasons, from his panda bento box to the detailed animal drawings he made in the art room at lunch, and even if Yukiko was never quite brave enough to stop them - Chie, she thinks, would've done so much better - she always helped calm him afterward. He liked to play house, too, and though she didn't care for the game even then, his smile was hard to refuse. She was a good senpai, a friend.

Then, years later, she let him down. So did most people - including Kanji himself. And even though he's been on the team for months, she still hasn't really talked to him about anything. She's not even sure what they have in common these days. They both have Personas, but a conversation about those would be silly. They both had Shadows, too - but a conversation about those would _hurt_ , and dredge up feelings Yukiko's been doing her best to sink deep beneath the surface.

* * *

 

It's almost ten at night, they're all worn threadbare by another visit to Nanako, and Yukiko finds herself paying attention to Kanji; watching him, or rather watching him watching Naoto. Maybe that's proof she's more observant than people believe - or perhaps Kanji's just completely obvious to everyone except Naoto.

He's sitting on the low brick wall lining the hospital parking lot. On impulse, Yukiko walks over, brushes away the light dusting of snow with her hand, and sits down beside him. "Hello, Kanji-kun."

"Uh. S'up, Yukiko-senpai." He pauses expectantly. "Need something?"

"Not really. I just thought we could, um. Talk?"

He stares at her for a second, then shrugs. "Cool."

It's a good start; at least he doesn't mind talking to her. The problem is she has absolutely no idea what to say.

Kanji leaps to her rescue. "So...uh. How's it going at the inn?"

The inn's still the last thing she really wants to talk about, but it's familiar ground. "Oh, not bad. A little slow. You know, after the murders."

"Oh. Yeah." He's watching Naoto again, though she's just standing by herself, shoulders slightly slumped as she looks down at her phone. "Shop's doin' alright. Maybe Junes won't run it outta business."

"That's good to hear."

The silence is thicker than the fog. Yukiko's skilled in conversation, but only the type she has to have with demanding and half-drunken guests, and Kanji - well, Kanji's Kanji.

"I'm sorry," she blurts, because she should have said it years ago.

He blinks at her. "Why?"

"We - we were friends before and I didn't stick with you. I walked away."

She's expecting – well, she's not sure. Anger, maybe. Or gruff rejection. Instead, he slowly shakes his head. "Ain't your fault. I shoved everyone away on purpose."

It would be impolite to ask why, since he isn't volunteering the details. Yukiko does it anyway. "Because of your father?"

Kanji doesn't answer immediately, as if he's debating speaking at all. Then, he mumbles, "Yeah. After he died...hell, I dunno. Everything went to shit." He stops and winces. "Uh, sorry. Cursing."

"I don't mind. You'd be surprised what I hear from the guests at the inn."

"That ain't right," he says, grimacing. "Don't know why you put up with it."

"I – almost didn't," Yukiko finds herself saying. The urge has been there for weeks to tell _someone_ other than Souji, as if that might make it all real. "I was going to leave town, leave the inn."

Kanji's eyebrows arch. "For real?"

She gives a small, quick nod. "The textiles shop. Haven't you ever..."

He leans forward and rests his elbows on his knees. "Nah. S'all I'm really good at. But you're _smart_ , Yukiko-senpai, you could do anythin'."

Maybe she really _could_. She dares to let herself believe that for a second, until she remembers the one thing she can't. "Well, it doesn't really matter now." Her breath forms a white cloud in the air. "I changed my mind. Souji," she adds, because he explains a lot, lately.

"He's been...talking to me 'bout some stuff too. Or he was. Everything with Nanako's kinda...y'know."

"I'm sure he'd be there for you if he could." She grips his shoulder. "We all would. We're your friends, Kanji-kun."

He stares back at Naoto, expression tight and unreadable. "Yeah. Friends."

And something in the way he says it makes Yukiko's own gaze drift toward Chie. She's chatting with Souji, a tired and tight smile on her face, and she's being as brave and stubborn as ever, and--

"I thought she was a guy for the longest time." Yukiko must look slightly confused, because Kanji clarifies, "Naoto, I mean." He sighs, shakes his head again, and stretches out his legs. "Turned all that shit over and over in my mind. A guy liking a guy - and everything that goes with that, 'specially in a town like this."

Yukiko swallows, hard. "Yes. It would be...difficult."

"She still is kinda a guy, really. But I know it ain't the same," he says, and Yukiko doesn't need to ask _the same as what_. "S'all about what people think they see, not what's going on underneath. We'd still take shit for it, but not on the same level."

_You don't have to tell me this_ , Yukiko wants to say.

There are expectations. Assumptions. Yukiko's lived with them her entire life and confronting her Shadow couldn't change that. One day soon her parents will arrange a marriage to an appropriate, upstanding, well-bred young man, and they'll run the inn together and follow the script to the last letter. It'll be perfect.

Kanji defied the expectations people placed on him, and look where it got him. He's subject to all the wrong assumptions now, and so would Yukiko if she ever dared to--

She grips the edge of the wall, the brick scratchy and cold against her fingers.

"You should try asking Naoto-kun out," she says, partly to change the subject, mostly because at least one person can have what they want. "It couldn't hurt."

"Sure it could. You know that," Kanji says. "Better'n anyone."

"I don't know what you mean," Yukiko lies.

Again, he sighs - more a brief breath of air – and gives her a reproving half-smile. "Souji-senpai's pep-talk ain't the only reason you decided to stay, is it?"

Falling in love with your best friend is one thing. Yukiko's situation is a whole new level of complexity. One she's not sure she'll ever be able to deal with - and then there's the assumption that the other person feels the same way. What would happen if she _doesn't_?

Maybe Chie doesn't _want_ to be her prince. Not like that.

"I...really, really like her," Kanji says, with a quick nod toward Naoto. "But I feel like it's never gonna happen, you know? She don't even notice me." He looks at Chie, then at Yukiko. "You got way more of a chance. Even if it ain't simple."

Yukiko's never been the brave one. That's always fallen to Chie, strength and compassion and courage all wrapped up in one clumsy bundle. But Kanji's brave, too. Even if he stammers and looks away every time Naoto tries to talk to him, Yukiko thinks he might find the confidence with a little push. The alternative - him still being in love with her years from now and never speaking up - is too sad to consider.

The same applies to Yukiko.

"Maybe I do have an advantage," she says, trying to smile. "But how are you going to get anywhere if you're too shy to talk to her?"

Kanji's brow furrows. "...I talked to her after we got her outta the TV."

"You yelled at her, Kanji-kun. It's not quite the same thing."

There's a long pause - and then he stands up. "Alright," he says. "Alright."

He turns to walk toward Naoto, but Yukiko quickly lays a hand on his arm. "I meant what I said. I'm sorry I was such a bad friend."

"I was too. But we're trying to be good ones now, right?" He looks at Naoto again. "Maybe I don't have to keep pushin' people away." Then he's heading away toward her, boots crunching against the snow.

Yukiko watches him stand next to Naoto, slightly hunched over as if unconsciously trying to bend down to her level. He glances away, runs a hand through his hair - and then she sees his lips moving. Naoto looks a little surprised at first, but then she's talking back and Kanji's nodding and maybe the two of them will keep a conversation going for more than ten seconds.

Yukiko's given him the push he needs, or at least a little one. Maybe she needs to push herself.

...Maybe next time.

A few meters away and a little hazy in the fog, Chie's now doing leg stretches against the wall. Yukiko stands up and walks toward her.

Chie grins as she sees her approach. That same tiredness as before leaves it a little taut at the edges, but it's still genuine. "Oh, hey! Ready to go home? I'll walk you."

Yukiko slips her hand in Chie's and forces a smile. "I'm ready. Thank you, Chie."


End file.
